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Friday, 16 May 2014

The Invisible Web Man

The new EU law on Internet search results ...... the right to be forgotten or opt out of the Internet search results, is yet another in a long line of stupid decisions by a European Court that is almost semi-literate about the real world, and how the Internet works.

The Web Invisible Man Of Europe

I can maybe understand the right to have web sites take down incorrect information, or even spent criminal charges, that no one has the right to see elsewhere. But search engines are not where this information resides, its merely the road map to the content of the Internet .... its sites like this one that hold the information.

Obviously the idiots who came up with this law, chose to attack the search result provider because they can do it easily, rather than individual sites around the world. However how Google and the others such as Bing (other search providers are available), are supposed to police this arrant nonsense is not explained by the court. Probably because they haven't the slightest clue how it should work. On the face of it, Google and the others will be forced to just censor every requested result, or risk European courts fining them.

So just one day later, guess who are the first through the gate requesting 'web invisibility' .... a bad politician (who wants details of his bad behaviour struck from web records), an incompetent doctor with bad patients reviews, and a paedophile, convicted of downloading child pornography ... that about sums it up.

Another bit of clear thinking by the EU courts .... we now have lost the right to 'know' inside the EU. Apparently the court believes that what the individuals wants, outweighs any society gains .... a blow for big brother everywhere. I wonder if we can sue the EU when the first person who would have been protected by open knowledge, is hurt when that the information was not available because of this law. e.g If said paedophile is now hidden from view again, how can the Sarah's Law or Megans Law still work?

It would serve Europe right if all the major search engines abandoned Europe, and left us to the tender mercies of the only search engine that really knows how to censor results ..... Baidu in China.

4 comments:

Someone has pointed out that this ruling contravenes human rights law. The Charter of Fundamental Rights says everyone is free 't receive and impart information and ideas without interference by a public authority'

I agree that Its all rather strange .... the ruling seems perverse at best and certainly against general public interest. However EU Commissioner Viviane Reding described the decision as "a clear victory for the protection of personal data of Europeans", while freedom of speech campaigners have suggested the vague ruling will unravel in the face of further test cases.

The Campaign group Index on Censorship has condemned the decision, saying it "violates the fundamental principles of freedom of expression. It allows individuals to complain to search engines about information they do not like with no legal oversight. This is akin to marching into a library and forcing it to pulp books."

Exciting times for you Europeans. I see that the BBC are reporting that more information removal requests have been revealed and they included:

- A man who tried to kill members of his own family who has asked for links to a news article to be taken down- A celebrity's child who wanted links to news articles about a criminal conviction removed- A suspended university lecturer who asked for the removal of links to articles mentioning the disciplinary action- A convicted cyberstalker who, after being cited in an article about cyberstalking law, wants links to it taken down- An actor who has asked for links to articles about an affair he had with a teenager taken down- A man convicted of running a tax scam who wants all links referencing the event removed - A business has also sought for links to negative reviews on a forum to be removed.

And that more than half of requests sent to Google from UK individuals involved convicted criminals.

That imbecilic EU court have to face up to the fact that they have created a criminals playground in Europe, where pedophiles, con arists and bunko operators, and even murderers can thrive in complete anonymity. This is because there is no 'Freedom of Speech' defence across the whole of the EU, unlike here in the USA.

You have just killed the Internet across Europe in the name of the criminals.